


Then and now

by ChocoNut



Series: Many ways to say I love you [89]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: 8x2 missing scene, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fluff, Matchmaker Tyrion Lannister, Season 8, Soft Confession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:49:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27669796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChocoNut/pseuds/ChocoNut
Summary: “Fabled loser of the Battle of the Whispering Wood,” Jaime corrects the perception his brother’s trying to create.All eyes shift to the wench who shifts uncomfortably. “You were his jailor, weren’t you?” Tormund makes the connection, eyes round with awe and surprise. “You had the king killer at your mercy!”ORThe one where Tormund butts in, but Tyrion doesn’t let him.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Series: Many ways to say I love you [89]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1234904
Comments: 14
Kudos: 97





	Then and now

“Fabled _loser_ of the Battle of the Whispering Wood,” Jaime corrects the perception his brother’s trying to create. His mind floats back to those days, to what now feels like another life. “What followed that was almost a year of being dragged around the Riverlands in chains.”

All eyes shift to the wench who shifts uncomfortably. “ _You_ were his jailor, weren’t you?” Tormund makes the connection, eyes round with awe and surprise. “You had the king killer at your mercy!”

Brienne colours slightly, takes a sip of her drink. “That was then.”

Tormund’s expression deteriorates to unadulterated glee. “You hated him, my lady.”

“That was then,” Tyrion thankfully intervenes before Jaime’s blood can boil away into vapour and puff out of his nostrils. “It’s been years. They’ve come a long way now—” he turns to Jaime for support “—haven’t you?”

While Jaime gives his affirmation with a gentle, dignified nod, he begs his brother with his eyes to bring this subject to an end.

“Oh, but that doesn’t change what happened,” Tormund keeps it on, refusing to let go. “She _hated_ him. He was the enemy.” His eyes go from rounds to slits. “Did you try to kill her and break free, Kingkiller?”

“I did once,” Jaime mutters, “but that—”

“See—” Tormund takes a triumphant swig off his horn “—that’s what enemies do—”

“It did change over time,” Tyrion jumps in again, drowning himself into the challenge. “He lost his hand for her.”

The wildling simply shrugs. “Any knight would’ve done that to protect the honour of a woman.”

“He leapt in front of a bear to save her,” his brother reveals, taking this dismissal as a personal insult. “What do you say to that?”

“Any knight would’ve done that,” Tormund, again, quotes what he thinks is a sublime understanding of an oath he knows nothing of. “They’re honour bound to do that— aren’t they?” He looks at Davos who clearly appears far from keen on participating. “Isn’t that what you knights are supposed to do? Protect those in trouble?”

Jaime rolls his eyes; he’s tempted to strike back, but there’s a reluctant corner of him that points out that not all is flawed with the man’s logic.

“He let her escape when the time was right, saved her from our sister,” Tyrion thrashes back on his behalf. “And as Lady Brienne herself acknowledges, he armed her, armoured her, and sent her to rescue the lady of Winterfell.”

Tormund’s silent for a bit, thinking, perhaps, and fortunately, doesn’t toss back the same retort.

“He took Riverrun without bloodshed only because Lady Brienne requested that of him,” Tyrion continues with enthusiasm now that he has the upper hand. “Despite the Blackfish insulting him, refusing to surrender, he let the lady and her squire escape into the night,” he adds, and Jaime can feel something swelling in his chest. Her parting wave, the sinking feeling that he’s never going to see her again that gripped him that day—how can he ever forget that? While it was a victorious moment for the crown, for his house and Cersei, the sight of her rowing away into nothing made it feel far from that.

Tormund opens his mouth to argue. “That—”

“—is not something one would do for an enemy,” Tyrion emphatically points out. “My brother came to Winterfell because—”

“—it was the right thing to do,” Tormund says, regaining some of his lost confidence. “His sister made a promise and he chose to honour it.”

 _You came to Winterfell because your heart lies here,_ an honest, but hard hitting voice inside Jaime tells him. _Should you perish, you wish to wither away in her arms. Should you live, you yearn to spend every night in her arms and every day by her side, in her heart._

All of this striking him one after the other in never ending jolts, Jaime feels the sweat dampening his palm, and bitten by a sudden need to hear her heart, he sneaks a glance at Brienne whose eyes are buried in her drink.

“Lady Brienne defended him at the trial, brought out his true side, showed everyone where his heart, his loyalties lie,” Tyrion is still going on. “If there’s still any bitterness between them, she wouldn’t have—”

“Can we please talk about something else?” Brienne stops him, and Jaime is left wishing he could read her mind.

+++++

When, at last, their companions have cleared off, Jaime gets the great hall and the newly crowned knight’s company to himself.

But before he can mull things over on how to broach a conversation, she’s on her feet, ready to flee. “We must get some rest—”

“I did none of it because _any knight would’ve done that_.” He has to speak out. _Now_. If there isn’t a tomorrow, he doesn’t want to go out with this as the last thing gnawing away inside him. “Any knight might have, but that is not _just_ it, Brienne.”

He has her attention. Gone is her urge to run away. She goes all rigid, eyes darting down to the empty glass again, staying there for a few uncomfortable seconds before she finally looks up at him. “I don’t hate you anymore.”

“I know that.” But he is not naive. Not hating someone may or may not translate to an emotion deeper than kinship or regard or friendship. He pushes away the chair between them, steps closer. “About Tormund Giantsbane—are you and him—is there anything between you and—”

“No,” she cuts him, flat and firm.

“And why not?” He studies her eyes, observes how they reply to every word he utters. “The North is in awe of you. If not him, you could’ve had someone else _and_ fulfilled your vow to Catelyn Stark, so why, then—”

“You’ve always been loyal to your family, your sister,” she ducks away from his question. “You told me so, yourself, when we last met, when you—” She frowns at the memory. “Why did you come to Winterfell, Ser Jaime?” she asks, taking her inquiry a step further. “And why did you knight me—”

“You made _me_ ,” he admits with a rush of gratitude and so much more. “The least I could do was make a knight of you.” He’s still searching for an entrance to her heart through those luminous eyes, hoping she’ll let him in. “You have long been worthy of it, Brienne.”

She’s about to say something, but resorts to just flicking her tongue across her lips. “I must go—”

“You haven’t yet told me why you didn’t seek a suitable husband.”

Her hand slips down to the golden lion on her waist. “Because my heart no longer is with me. So how could I possibly—” She bats her eyelashes adorably as a warm pink flush begins to rise up her neck. “What about you, Ser Jaime?” A slim trace of doubt still persists in her eyes. “You haven’t yet told me why you came here. Apart from the obvious reason of wanting to do the right thing, of course.”

“All my life, I’ve always followed my heart.” Jaime brings his hand to hers, hugs her fingers as they caress the lion in a fond embrace. “Now that it's no longer King’s Landing it resides in, how could I have stayed there, my lady?”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. Let me know your thoughts!


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